Nano Jungle - Flexi Mini - fully planted

[Kalum]

Yeah push it down mate it will cover nice
Cheers
Jay

Not rooted enough for that quite yet but that's the plan once it beds itself in

 

[Kalum]

Mini iwagumi experiment is growing in well but this might be a short lived tank due to the seiryu stone raising the hardness of the water more than expected and won't suit the Taiwan bee shrimp which it was going to be home to, sometimes you have to adapt your plans so watch this space....

 

[Kalum]

Struggling to keep the tds of this tank down, comparing with my other 2 tanks this is 250ppm a day after water change and the other 2 are consistently half of that

Tap water is under 30ppm but this tank obviously has a larger stone to water volume ratio so looks like it must be having an effect on it

 

[The Accidental Aquascaper]

I was under the impression that seiryu stone overtime will be coated in biofilm that stops it raising the hardness. Is this completely wrong?

Looks like you haven’t got a speck of algae, so maybe that’s your problem, lol!

250ppm doesn’t seem that bad to me, my tap water is 300-400ppm, I can only dream of 30ppm on tap!

It’s looking good, whatever your TDS

 

[Kalum]

@The Accidental Aquascaper I thought the same tbh and I have a fair amount from the same batch in my 140L and tds in that is a steady 120 after a 50% water change, same as my other tank with manzanita as the only hardscape so no leaching so to speak (or diluted by water volume)

Any parameter shifts will obviously be exaggerated with such a small tank but didn't expect it to be this high, but I had never planned this as a long term tank so I'll just need to speed up my next plans for it...

Haha trust me there's plenty of diatoms in amongst the HC, I've lowered the light to 70% and added frogbit to help since there is such low plant mass

Thanks mate that's much appreciated and I know I sound like a spoiled brat moaning about my 'high' tank tds of 250ppm when I pretty much have RO on tap

 

[alto]

was under the impression that seiryu stone overtime will be coated in biofilm that stops it raising the hardness. Is this completely wrong?

I’ve wondered about this as well, I’ve some “Seiryu” stone in 1-2 yr old scapes where even with 1-3 month intervals between water changes, change in KH/GH/pH was insignificant

In contrast, I’ve some alternate sourced (new) “Seiryu” stone, and observed significant KH/GH/pH increase over a couple weeks

 

[MJQMJQ]

I believe it works like how driftwood leaches tannins for a while but then stops cos its tannin supply is exhausted?And Im guessing perhaps the dirt on the surface of the seiryu might contribute?

 

[Kalum]

I've just clicked that main piece on the left of this was bought separate a while ago from the rest and remains dusty when cleaning it (even after thoroughly scrubbing it all before hand) while the rest doesn't give off much when scrubbing, i always expect a bit of leaching from seiryu but not quite this much, it's clearly different in some way to the rest in how it's reacting in water

anyway it's all a good experiment and planning the rescape, this will continue for another month and i'll work on the carpet just for a bit of fun then it will be stripped and redone

 

[Jayefc1]

I have stone like that one i did ask yoh if it was millennium stone a whilr ago as it looked the same as mine i got from aquarium gardens when i clean the millennium stone it gives off an incredible amount of milky white dust if yoh break it looks the same as serya in the middle but its a diffrent surface and the TDS in the tank is higher than other and that is in a 60p
Cheers
Jay

 

[Kalum]

yeh your comment earlier got me thinking once i noticed the TDS issues @Jayefc1, i've got a big box of seiryu which i've bought from 3 sources (all badged as seiryu) and this was the 1 stone in the collection which was bought from my LFS so clearnly not quite the same as the rest cheers for the info mate and sounds like you were on to something

 

[Kalum]

This has run its course so time for a new nano scape

 

[Kalum]

New rough hardscape layout

 

[Kalum]

Just waiting on eleocharis mini and some buce turning up and it'll be complete

Will be home to my betta while I redo my 45P tank

 

[Kalum]

 

[Kalum]

Now fully planted, looking forward to this one growing in